{"quotes":[{"text":"Our house was an old Tudor mansion. My father was very particular in keeping the smallest peculiarities of his home unaltered. Thus the many peaks and gables, the numerous turrets, and the mullioned windows with their quaint lozenge panes set in lead, remained very nearly as they had been three centuries back. Over and above the quaint melancholy of our dwelling, with the deep woods of its park and the sullen waters of the mere, our neighborhood was thinly peopled and primitive, and the people round us were ignorant, and tenacious of ancient ideas and traditions. Thus it was a superstitious atmosphere that we children were reared in, and we heard, from our infancy, countless tales of horror, some mere fables doubtless, others legends of dark deeds of the olden time, exaggerated by credulity and the love of the marvelous. ('Horror: A True Tale').","author":"John Berwick Harwood","tags":["fable","folklore","horror","superstition"],"id":1805,"author_id":"John+Berwick+Harwood"},{"text":"The job of reflection is to add a dimension of fable to the reality!","author":"Mehmet Murat ildan","tags":["add","dimension","fable","job","mehmet-murat-ildan","mehmet-murat-ildan","reality","reflection"],"id":5150,"author_id":"Mehmet+Murat+ildan"},{"text":"It has always been a mystery to me how Adam, Eve, and the serpent were taught the same language. Where did they get it? We know now, that it requires a great number of years to form a language; that it is of exceedingly slow growth. We also know that by language, man conveys to his fellows the impressions made upon him by what he sees, hears, smells and touches. We know that the language of the savage consists of a few sounds, capable of expressing only a few ideas or states of the mind, such as love, desire, fear, hatred, aversion and contempt. Many centuries are required to produce a language capable of expressing complex ideas. It does not seem to me that ideas can be manufactured by a deity and put in the brain of man. These ideas must be the result of observation and experience.","author":"Robert G. Ingersoll","tags":["adam-and-eve","aversion","bible","brain","centuries","contempt","deity","desire","experience","expression","fable","fantasy","fear","garden-of-eden","growth","hatred","ideas","impressions","knowledge","language","love","myth","observation","savage","senses","serpent","the-bible"],"id":53988,"author_id":"Robert+G.+Ingersoll"},{"text":"We read the pagan sacred books with profit and delight. With myth and fable we are ever charmed, and find a pleasure in the endless repetition of the beautiful, poetic, and absurd. We find, in all these records of the past, philosophies and dreams, and efforts stained with tears, of great and tender souls who tried to pierce the mystery of life and death, to answer the eternal questions of the Whence and Whither, and vainly sought to make, with bits of shattered glass, a mirror that would, in very truth, reflect the face and form of Nature's perfect self.These myths were born of hopes, and fears, and tears, and smiles, and they were touched and colored by all there is of joy and grief between the rosy dawn of birth, and death's sad night. They clothed even the stars with passion, and gave to gods the faults and frailties of the sons of men. In them, the winds and waves were music, and all the lakes, and streams, and springs,—the mountains, woods and perfumed dells were haunted by a thousand fairy forms. They thrilled the veins of Spring with tremulous desire; made tawny Summer's billowed breast the throne and home of love; filled Autumns arms with sun-kissed grapes, and gathered sheaves; and pictured Winter as a weak old king who felt, like Lear upon his withered face, Cordelia's tears. These myths, though false, are beautiful, and have for many ages and in countless ways, enriched the heart and kindled thought. But if the world were taught that all these things are true and all inspired of God, and that eternal punishment will be the lot of him who dares deny or doubt, the sweetest myth of all the Fable World would lose its beauty, and become a scorned and hateful thing to every brave and thoughtful man.","author":"Robert G. Ingersoll","tags":["absurd","autumn","beautiful","birth","brave","death","delight","deny","doubt","dreams","effort","eternity","fable","fairy","fear","gods","grief","hateful","haunted","hope","joy","king-lear","lake","life","love","mountains","music","mystery","nature","pagan","passion","past","perfection","philosophies","pleasure","poetic","punishment","questions","religion-myths","sacred-books","scorn","shakespeare","smiles","spring","summer","tears","tender","thought","throne","true","truth","william-shakespeare","winter","woods"],"id":64681,"author_id":"Robert+G.+Ingersoll"},{"text":"Dead tree branches rattled,the cold wind seethed, it prattled of abominations about to unfold.A lone wolf howled,the full moon it prowled,ready for evils untold.","author":"A. Lee Brock","tags":["fable","gothic-fiction","poetry"],"id":104674,"author_id":"A.+Lee+Brock"},{"text":"Envy said, “Girl, I remember well,ye, who I flung from Hell,and not a day has passed, I haven’t missedthe loss of your soul that I mourned,I’ve been bereft and forlorn,for the sweet taste of your flesh I’ve yet to kiss.But no worries—bygones,that’s the past—long gone,I don’t hold a grudge, no, in no way.And though your family they did swindlemy joy of flaying ye on a spindle, I begrudge ye not a little, so let’s play.So, merely toss your token in my well,and all your dreams I will unveil,for ye alone, them I’ll grant.Come closer, little Penny,your hands I know are not empty,ye have something I dreadfully want.","author":"A. Lee Brock","tags":["fable","fairy-tale","gothic-fiction","horror","poetry"],"id":108313,"author_id":"A.+Lee+Brock"},{"text":"Nature is what we know. We do not know the gods of religions. And nature is not kind, or merciful, or loving. If God made me — the fabled God of the three qualities of which I spoke: mercy, kindness, love — He also made the fish I catch and eat. And where do His mercy, kindness, and love for that fish come in? No; nature made us — nature did it all — not the gods of the reli.","author":"Thomas A. Edison","tags":["atheism","contradiction","fable","gods","loving","merciful","nature","superstition"],"id":116123,"author_id":"Thomas+A.+Edison"},{"text":"In Pliny I read about the invention of clay modeling. A Sicyonian potter came to Corinth. There his daughter fell in love with a young man who had to make frequent long journeys away from the city. When he sat with her at home, she used to trace the outline of his shadow that a candle’s light cast on the wall. Then, in his absence she worked over the profile, deepening, so that she might enjoy his face, and remember. One day the father slapped some potter’s clay over the gouged plaster; when the clay hardened he removed it, baked it, and 'showed it abroad' (63).","author":"Annie Dillard","tags":["fable","fairy-tale","folk-tale","legend","muslim","myth","shadow","story","tale"],"id":119368,"author_id":"Annie+Dillard"},{"text":"In hundreds of years of wish fulfillment,never once to the demon’s bereavement,had a wish gone unable to be yielded.It was love this day, which defeated the curse,and there in Hell there was little worse,than the dark forces of evil gone unwielded.","author":"A. Lee Brock","tags":["fable","fairy-tale","gothic-fiction","horror","poetry"],"id":120541,"author_id":"A.+Lee+Brock"},{"text":"Some women have kissed—and some are kissing—a lot of frogs, even though the very first man that they have each kissed was and is still a prince.","author":"Mokokoma Mokhonoana","tags":["aphorism","aphorisms","aphorist","aphorists","breakup","breakups","date","dating","divorce","divorces","fable","fables","fairy-tale","fairy-tales","fantasies","fantasy","fiction","frog","frogs","funny","hilarious","humor","humorous","humour","joke","jokes","king","kings","kiss","kiss-a-frog","kiss-a-lot-of-frogs","kisser","kissers","kissing","marriage","marriages","prince","princes","princess","princesses","queen","queens","quotations","quotes","relationship","relationships","romance","romantic","satire","woman","women"],"id":123890,"author_id":"Mokokoma+Mokhonoana"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":32,"pages":4,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}